On Feb 13, 2017, teenagers Liberty “Libby” German, 14, and Abigail “Abby” Williams, 13 were dropped off near Monon High Bridge, a popular hiking trail in the small community of Delphi, Indiana. Their plan was to walk the trail before being picked up to go home. During their walk, German posted two photos on her Snapchat account, one of a bridge and another of Williams. It was the last time anyone saw the pair alive. The next day, authorities found their bodies in a wooded area several miles from the trail, sparking a years-long investigation that captured the attention of local and national investigators. Now, seven years later, 52-year-old Richard Allen is on trial for German and Williams’ murder. And less than a week into the Delphi Murders trial, it already has the makings of becoming a mystery — or mess — online.
The deaths of German and William became an immediate priority of the Delphi police as soon as their bodies were discovered. But as police struggled to find a viable suspect in the days following the girls’ murder, the case grew an outsized legacy in national news. Police first released a photo of a man they identified as a prime suspect in the murders. Days later, police revealed that the photo and an additional video had been recovered directly from German’s cellphone. The audio in the clip is muffled, but a man can be seen walking behind them, and he appears to tell the girls to go “down the hill.” Police offered a $41,000 reward for anyone who could identify the suspect, who became known online as “Bridge Guy.” “This young lady is a hero, there’s no doubt,” Indiana State Police Sgt. Tony Slocum said of German at the time. “To have enough presence of mind to activate that video system on her cellphone, to record what we believe is criminal behavior that’s about to occur.”
But it took another five years for police to arrest a suspect. Allen had been interviewed by authorities days after the girls’ murder and confirmed he was on the bridge at the same time, but just to “watch fish.” A witness at the bridge reported seeing a man matching Allen’s description covered in mud and blood — and after seeing a video of “Bridge Guy,” connected the two. According to a probable cause affidavit that was unsealed in 2022, investigators tied Allen to the scene with an unused .40 caliber round that was found next to German and Williams’ bodies. The ammo matched a gun found at Allen’s home. He pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder while “committing or attempting to commit kidnapping,” according to the Associated Press.
Much of the delay in trying Allen’s case has come from both authorities’ problems with identifying a suspect and the intense national interest in the case. In 2022, photos of the crime scene and additional evidence were leaked, which led to a legal battle over what party was responsible. Allen’s legal team initially withdrew from the case after the evidence was leaked, but was reinstated by a judge because finding a new legal team would drag the case on longer. In 2022, Allen County Superior Court Judge Fran Gull issued a gag order for the trial, barring the defense, prosecution, witnesses, and family members from making any public statements. No cameras or audio recording devices are allowed in the courtroom. And the jury will also be held under strict sequestration, meaning they’re unable to use social media or watch any news while the trial is taking place.
Because of the strict gag order and lack of filmed content, true crime enthusiasts on TikTok who post about the case have begun compiling information from both reputable and unchecked sources. There are hundreds of videos regurgitating trial information that has been filtered from new sites to journalists, to bloggers, and now content creators. The prosecution and defense both agree that the girls were brutally murdered. But while the prosecution is arguing that Allen kidnapped and murdered the girls, hiding them in the woods to cover his tracks, Allen’s defense claims that the girls were ritually murdered as a part of a practice of Norse paganism called Odinism. This theory of pagan sacrifice has been heavily fixated on by true crime enthusiasts interested in the trial.
While established true crime accounts on TikTok often pride themselves on only disseminating information from reputable sources, like CNN, local news, or the Associated Press, the interest in the case has turned dozens of amateur watchers into sleuths. Some claim the length of time it took to find a suspect heavily indicates a coverup — one possibly linked to Odinism. Others have taken to implicating witnesses in the case, including members of Williams’ and German’s families. (When reached for comment by Rolling Stone, a spokesperson for TikTok noted that the app’s community guidelines prohibit harmful misinformation and conspiracy theories and that content containing these are not eligible for the for-you-feed.)
This isn’t the first time TikTok’s true crime community has banded together to try and solve a case. In 2023, following the murder of four University of Idaho students, it took police six weeks to name and arrest Bryan Kohberger, a suspect in the case. But during the time before Kohberger’s arrest, some true crime enthusiasts on TikTok began accusing and publicly naming strangers as responsible for the killings — even blaming some of the students who survived the murders. The 2024 trial of Karen Read, a Massachusetts woman accused of running over her boyfriend with a car, also became a fixation on the app, with true crime accounts raking in millions of views by dissecting testimony and trial evidence. Now they’ve moved on to the Delphi Murders.
“The fascination of true crime on social media is just an extension of the fascination about crime,” Jeffrey Lin, a criminology professor at the University of Denver, previously told Rolling Stone. “We want to be able to control crimes that feel out of control. We have this intense desire to help and be heroic, and yet we have no opportunity to do so. Most of us are not able to become high-level researchers [for the FBI] but we can get on TikTok and look for [Brian Laundrie’s] van. This is just the fulfillment of the fantasy that’s been presented to us for decades.”
Allen’s trial began on Oct. 18, and is expected to last a month. But online, the same interest and speculation that made the Delphi Murders a national news story is ramping up again — and laying the groundwork for potential misinformation in the process.